Research Interests

Department

Finance

Bio

Dr. Robinson is an Associate Professor of Finance, in the Haskayne School of Business, an organization he joined in 1990. He has a B.Math degree (Majoring in Computer Science) from the University of Waterloo, and an MBA and Ph.D. in Finance from the University of Western Ontario. He also is a holder of the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) designation granted by the CFA Institute in Charlottesville, Virginia, and the certified corporate director designation (ICD.D) from the Institute of Corporate Directors in Toronto, Ontario. Prior to joining the U. of C. he taught at two other Canadian universities: Wilfrid Laurier University and the University of Western Ontario. Dr. Robinson has also been a sessional instructor for the Osgoode Hall Law School at York University, a Visiting Professor at the University of Petroleum in Changping, China and a Visiting Professor at the Warsaw School of Economics, Warsaw, Poland.

Dr. Robinson teaches investments, portfolio management, and corporate governance to undergraduate, MBA, Executive MBA, and executive education students. He founded the Calgary Portfolio Management Trust (CPMT) program at the Haskayne School of Business in 1993. He is also the Calgary Academic Director of the Directors’ Education Program, a joint initiative of the Haskayne School of Business, the Rotman School of Management, and the Institute of Corporate Directors. He was awarded the Haskayne Dean’s Award for Teaching Excellence for the 2005/2006 academic year.

Dr. Robinson has non-academic work experience as a computer programmer and systems analyst, and more recently he worked as a Venture Capitalist while on a leave from the University of Calgary. In this later position he was the lead investor for several multi-million dollar investments in high technology firms in Western Canada. Dr. Robinson has served as a member of the Board of Directors for a number of private and public Canadian companies. As well, Dr. Robinson was the Inaugural Director of the Creative Destruction Lab Rockies program between 2017 and 2018, and is the former Chair of the Investment Operations Committee which provided oversight of Alberta Investment Management, a department of Alberta Finance, which managed over $50 billion of assets on behalf of the Government of Alberta and selected public sector pension plans. He currently sits on the Board of the Calgary CFA Society, the Board of Governors of the Glenbow Museum, the Board of Governors of the Certified General Accountants of Alberta, and on the APEX Supplementary Pension Board. During his spare time, Dr. Robinson enjoys hiking, biking, rock climbing, and photography.

Dr. Robinson has published several books and academic research papers that study Canadian capital markets, market efficiency, and methods of raising equity capital for developing firms. His most recent interests include corporate governance practices in Canada, the role of a firm’s board of directors in growth oriented firms, and the role of the private equity markets in financing growth-oriented firms in Alberta. A list of his recent publications is as follows:Refereed Research Articles:

Can Spending Time in the Minors Pay Off? An Examination of the Canadian Junior Public Equity Markets, (with Michele Meoli, J. Ari Pandes, and Silvio Vismara), Journal of Small Business Management, Vol. 56, S1, 2018, 88-107.

The IPO Market in Canada: What a Comparison with the United States Tells Us About a Global Problem, (with Bryce C. Tingle and J. Ari Pandes), Canadian Business Law Journal, Vol. 54, No. 3, 2013, 321-367.